January 5, 1895. 
THE GARDENING WORLD. 
293 
common to find many of them south of London at this 
time during mild seasons, but I do not remember any 
Christmas in the Midlands when they have been 
so plentiful as they are at present. I notice also 
that the tree Paeony has made young shoots upwards 
of 3 in. in length during the last few days, and the 
sap is active in many plants that come from 
warmer climes : Aconite, yellow (Eranthis hyemalis), 
Anemone blanda, Anemone hortensis, Aubrietia 
graeca, Andromeda floribunda. Antirrhinum majus, 
Arabis albida, Borago officinalis, Berberis Bealii, 
Carnation (white seedling), Chimonanthus fragrans, 
Chrysanthemum (nine varieties), Daisy (single and 
double), Eccremocarpus scaber, Escallonia punc¬ 
tata, Furze (common single), Geranium Roberti- 
anum, Garrya eliptica, Helleborus niger, Helleborus 
hybrids, Honesty, Iberis gibraltarica hybrida, 
Jasminum nudiflorum, Laurustinus, Lamium 
maculatum, Morina longifolia, Meconopsis cam- 
brica, Magnolia grandiflora (not expanded), Mari¬ 
gold (common), Myosotis dissitiflora, Othonna 
cheirifolia, Polygala chamaebuxus, Polyanthus (in 
variety), Primrose (common yellow), Primrose 
(double lilac). Rhododendron (in variety), Roses, 
China, in quantity, tea, and h p., Scabious, Saxi- 
fragra ligulata, Snowdrop (common), Stock, Tussi- 
lago fragrans, Vinca minor, Violet (common 
Russian), Violet (double Lady Hume Campbell), 
Wallflower (Belvoir Castle yellow),Wallflower, (Miss 
Hope, double yellow). 
Death of Mr. Charles Collins.—With very sincere 
regret we have to record the death of a most 
estimable brother journalist in the person of Mr. 
Charles Collins, of the staff of the Journal of Horti¬ 
culture, which sad event took place suddenly on 
entering a train at Forest Gate Station on the 
evening of the 26th ult. Mr. Collins, though only 
about 30 years of age, had been engaged on the 
London horticultural Press for several years, and by 
his ability, studious habits, and amiability of dis¬ 
position, and the quiet courage with which he was 
known to be fighting the battle of life against mis¬ 
fortunes, both personal and domestic, that would 
have broken the heart of many a physically stronger 
man, had won for himself the warm esteem and 
respect of his fellow-workers and all who knew his 
sterling worth. Born in Hampshire, and left father¬ 
less early in life, with an impediment in his speech 
that he never overcame, his struggles for existence 
commenced at an early age, and may truthfully be 
said to have only ended with his lamentable death 
under such tragic circumstances. He commenced 
his gardening career under Mr. Summers at Sand- 
beck Park, Rotherham, in 1880, and subsequently 
served under Mr. Sampson at Wortley, and Mr. 
Inglis at Howick Castle, Northumberland. The 
impediment in his speech was a great obstacle to 
progress in his professional career, and on the 
advice of Mr. Simpson he did his best to qualify 
himself as a writer for the Press, and after some 
rough experience on a paper long since defunct, he 
became associated with Mr. T. W. Sanders on the 
staff of Amateur Gardening, subsequently serving for 
a few months under Dr. Masters, F.R.S., on the 
Gardeners' Chronicle, and then joined the staff of the 
Journal of Horticulture, where for nearly three years 
he gave the greatest satisfaction to his employer, 
Dr. Hogg. He was at work, cheerful and hopeful, 
until Christmas Eve, but fate decided that he was 
not to see the number he had helped to send to 
press. .Poor fellow ! In life he did all that man 
could, struggling against great difficulties, to provide 
for. the proverbial rainy day, but fate was against 
him, and we grieve to say that he has left a delicate 
wife and two young children wholly unprovided for 
beyond the immediate present, and whose sad case 
ias enlisted the warm sympathy of all who knew 
-the kindly-natured husband and father, the persever¬ 
ing, silently courageous man who ever hoped for the 
best, and who often carried a cheerful presence in 
company with an aching heart, but quite unknown 
to any but his more immediate friends. 
Tecoma stans is a very decorative lawn plant, 
stately in appearance and with vivid green foliage 
and golden-yellow and trumpet-shaped blossoms. It 
blooms continuously and profusely, and its branches 
are often weighted down with its wealth of flowers. 
If cut down by frost it soon grows up again. Its 
blossoms are followed by peculiarly shaped fruit, 
each of which contains a hard-shelled seed, which, 
when planted, germinates very readily. When in 
-the prime of its beauty, that is when covered with 
^blossom and fruit, it calls forth exclamations of 
-praise from all who behold it. 
SATURDAY HALF-HOLIDAY FOR 
GARDENERS. 
This is confessedly an age of social improvement. 
Liberality, generosity, and philanthropy stamp their 
impress on every side we choose to turn our eyes. 
The apothegm ■' man’s inhumanity to man ” is fast 
crumbling before the detergent and nobler one 
“ Peace, goodwill towards man." The poor are no 
longer indigently poor. On every hand arise some 
humane institution or large-souled individual which 
befriends the needy. The interests of the British 
workman have not escaped the sympathetic ear of 
the public. His wants have commanded equal 
attention with his humbler brother, and have as 
speedily received righteous adjustment. He owes 
unbounded gratitude to the immediate era of the 
past, and there is every reason that he should be 
gratefully anticipating the benefits of the future. 
The labour of his hands, mingled profusely with 
the sweat of his brow, are infinitively better re¬ 
munerated than in any preceding time. As a 
specimen of one of the noblest creatures of God, he 
is recognised with a magnanimity known only as a 
British product, to be a force in the propulsion of 
civilization that is not superseded by any. In con¬ 
sequence many liberal concessions have been made 
to him, with the view to increase his manhood to a 
conformity with the original design and intention of 
his Maker. The severity of his manacles were 
mightily softened, and his labours are no longer the 
essence of servitude. This also is redolent of the 
fragrance of peace and goodwill. His hours of 
labour are greatly lessened from what they were, and 
prospectively it seems as if they will be still further 
reduced. 
Our national harbingers of justice, benevolence, 
and goodwill have recognised the patent fact that 
efficiency and skill very much depend on the mental 
development, and not wholly on that of the 
limb, as formerly supposed. To attain to the 
acquisition of this desirable and worthy view of the 
matter, the same breath emits the philanthrophic 
declaration that it is necessary that the toiler should 
have more leisure time to produce the required 
results—this is so. The British workman hence is 
no longer the slave and drudge which his father has 
been, with his nose on the grindstone from break of 
dawn to dusk of night. 
Steadily and forcibly moved this avalanche in its 
advancing terror and power. The origin and pro¬ 
motion is altogether due to the good and peaceful 
Victorian reign which stands out unique for its 
marvellous strides of progression in all the history 
of the world. But, notwithstanding this eminently 
satisfactory progress of the general betterment of 
the Britisih workman, in no department has its 
effect been less influential and observable than in 
that of gardening. The marked generosity so 
prevalently forcible, and lavished with such profusion 
on other trades and crafts is, in the region of garden¬ 
ing, altogether unknown. Why this should be so is 
as inexplicable as it is real. It certainly is not due 
to gardeners themselves, for a more industrious, 
deserving, and intelligent class of artizans could not 
well be found among the ranks of British Workmen. 
And yet during the great industrial evolution of 
the last twenty or thirty years it cannot be said that 
gardeners hatfe reaped any benefit whatever. Trade 
Unionism in the gardeners’ case, I am convinced, 
is as unworthy of their intellectual abilities as it is 
fruitless to achieve an amiable settlement, and, at 
best, it is a very questionable weapon for redressing 
grievances in any civilized nation. 
The hours oflabour of the gardener are, in general 
too long. They average, all over the kingdom, sixty 
hours a week, and the young man who is on duty 
puts in a week of ninety-eight hours. True it may 
not be at all times severely laborious, but, never¬ 
theless, he is “ confined to barracks." In the winter 
time his duties are sometimes very laborious, in his 
attention to the firing, and in the summer, though 
firing is by no means an arduous duty, the Sunday 
watering, &c., makes up any difference. 
Now seeing that almost all British Workmen have 
a Saturday half-holiday (even our Edinburgh 
Nurserymen give their employes this privilege,) 
I think a general move ought to be made by 
gardeners to get the benefit of this, too. I am certain 
that few gentlemen would deny their gardeners this 
request if the matter were laid before them.— Gamma, 
Edinburgh. 
NOTICES OF BOOKS. 
"The Landscape Architect, devoted to Constructive 
Building and Kindred Trades, Landscape Gar¬ 
dening, Horticulture, Science and Art. Vista 
Publishing Co., Rochester, N.Y.” 
This is a monthly periodical published at Roch¬ 
ester, New York, and the September number, which 
was the first, is now before us. The text runs to 
twenty-four pages independently of advertisements, 
and we are pleased to see that the latter are confined 
to the pages entirely outside the text, contrary to the 
usual custom of most American journals. The 
scope of the Landscape Architect is rather an 
ambitious one considering the wide field which it 
covers. Should other numbers maintain the status of 
the first, the practical side of horticulture will 
receive but scanty attention, and gardeners—but 
particularly young ones—will derive but little advan¬ 
tage from the paper, Landscape, building construc¬ 
tion, science, and art receive ample consideration, so 
that the journal aims at supplying the wants of the 
more educated in the occupations to which it refers. 
A number of books new and old on different phases 
of gardening and other subjects, are reviewed by a 
writer ; n the September number; but the method of 
doing this is somewhat different to that pursued in 
this country, Some of the books reviewed are liter¬ 
ature pure and simple, such as that which treats of 
Shakespeare's genius. All this tends to show that the 
journal under notice, aims at the higher phases of 
the various subjects with which it deals ; in other 
words, that its pages are addressed to those who 
possess the advantages of the higher education. In 
an article on "Tall Office Building, Past and Future,’’ 
a writer dilates upon the modern aspects of city life, 
where people are crowded together for commercial 
purposes. In the case of tall buildings, he shows the 
advantages that persons of correlative business and 
pursuits derive by occupying different parts of one 
vast building—vast not merely in superficial area 
which it covers, but in its "sky-scraping" height; 
but on the other hand he regrets that it should be 
so, because he fears that it will be well nigh impos¬ 
sible to reach those great centres of industry owing 
to the congested state of the traffic, and fears that 
the towns built of such high buildings, will tend to 
shut out the light of day and become as unhealthy 
as the walled towns of the Middle Ages. 
The paper and letterpress are of a high order of 
merit, and the illustrations are neatly and artistically 
reproduced. A number of the latter consist of photo¬ 
graphs, but others are drawings, and the park bridge 
in the pleasure grounds of Seth Cook, Esq., San 
Rafael, California, is beautifully executed. The 
bridge was originally constructed to hide an unsightly 
quarry in the hillside ; and the quarry itself was 
filled with water and planted round with Magnolias 
and other subjects. 
-- 
JAPANESE FLOWERS AND GARDENS. 
Lecturing recently at the Midland Institute, Bir¬ 
mingham, on " Japanese Flowers and Gardens" Mr. 
Montague Fordham said that Japan was, above all 
things, famous for its flowers and its gardens. 
Landscape gardening there was a marvel of elabora¬ 
tion, the result of many centuries of study and 
handed-down tradition. So great was the love of 
flowers that from February to November was one 
long round of festivals, in many of which the whole 
nation took part. E'loral arrangement, too, has 
been carried to the perfection of a fine art. It was 
in the sixth century, Mr. Fordham explained, that 
the Japanese left off arranging flowers in the Western 
style of casual groups and masses, and began to 
develop the beautiful art that had ever since been 
deemed a study worthy of the greatest philosophers, 
priests, and courtiers. By the sixteenth century the 
art had attained a high state of perfection, and 
three centuries of most minute study of the habits 
and growth of plants and their proper arrangement 
had resulted in the formulation of rules of a degree 
of complexity that at once mystify and astound the 
European scholar. Contrast the attitude of a Jap. 
towards flowers with that of an Englishman. The 
latter knows what he likes, but does not know the 
reason why; while the former combines unbounded 
admiration of nature with an intense appreciation of 
art. If a Jap sees a hillside white with cherry 
blossom he is enthusiastic, and, looking at a work of 
art, he does not content himself with a passing 
glance, but sets to work in his capacity of art critic 
carefully to study both general effect and detai 
